


Carbon

by Ava_The_Stargazer



Category: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Genre: (it's not ok), Character Study, Clone Blues, Existential Angst, Existential Crisis, F/M, Gendo is Fucked Up, Get Rei A Therapist, Mildly Dubious Consent, Not Really Character Death, Rei Comes Back so It's OK, Sort Of, Talking to Oneself, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-09
Updated: 2018-02-09
Packaged: 2019-03-15 17:35:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13618308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ava_The_Stargazer/pseuds/Ava_The_Stargazer
Summary: Some nights, ones when he’s happy, Gendo comes into her room and talks to her. They talk about books or new developments in the Evas or the movie she watched in class.Sometimes they even read together.They sit side by side, her small frame is nestled next to his. His arm wraps around her shoulder, the other hand holding the book out so they both can read. He smells like aftershave and something smoky, and she finds herself growing fond of it.





	Carbon

**Author's Note:**

> DISCLAIMER: I wrote this after stumbling across the TvTropes page for Evangelion and reading it late at night. I thought the dynamic between Gendo and Rei sounded pretty cool and fanfic-worthy and ended up cranking this out at 2 AM with zero prior knowledge of the series aside from what was on TvTropes and what I could glean from a few forums I browsed for extra info. Thus, I had a very faint grasp on the characters and literally zero clue about the timeline of Evangelion. Ended up writing this and was actually pretty proud of it.
> 
> Later, I watched the series for real and you can imagine my horror when found out Rei I was NINE when she first died. So, MASSIVE DISCLAIMER: GENDO DOESN'T PURSUE A NINE YEAR OLD REI IN THIS FIC. I mean, I ain't against dark stuff, but JESUS. I ain't touching straight up pedophilia with a forty foot pole. That shit's gross.
> 
> Anyways, please don't yell at me, I know the timeline in this story is all kinds of fucked.

Some nights, ones when he’s happy, Gendo comes into her room and talks to her. They talk about books or new developments in the Evas or the movie she watched in class.

 

Sometimes they even read together.

 

They sit side by side, her small frame is nestled next to his. His arm wraps around her shoulder, the other hand holding the book out so they both can read. He smells like aftershave and something smoky, and she finds herself growing fond of it. The book is an older one this time. Its pages are thick and cream-colored, the ink words crammed together on the page. It tells of a world where Evas and Angels and NERV don’t exist.

 

Rei doesn’t remember that world. It’s difficult for Gendo to remember.

 

\---

 

Other nights, when he’s sad, he comes into her room and buries his face into the crook of her neck. She always knows when he’s been crying, because she can feel his tears drip onto her skin.

 

He cries for his wife.

 

Yui.

 

Rei feels almost envious, knowing that she’s always going to be runner up in his mind compared to her. All she’ll ever be is a rebound. _A replacement._ Second place to a more complete version of herself.

 

Gendo presses his forehead to her shoulder, jolting her out of her thoughts. She chases the jealousy out of her mind and ghosts a gentle kiss on his ear. He’s sensitive there.

 

She knows that from experience.

 

\---

 

Some nights he needs her more than normal. He leans over her on her bed, trailing hot kisses up and down her throat. His hands roam up and down her sides, needy.

 

They stop right at her hips. He pulls her closer to him, making sure she feels his arousal poking at her stomach from beneath the fabric of his pants.

 

He smiles a real, genuine smile, and she doesn't quite know how she feels about it. He speaks quietly to her, his breath hot and feather light against the shell of her ear. “Do you see what you do to me?”

 

She bites her lip and nods. A low groan slips past his lips, and he kisses her hard, one of his hands slipping underneath her shirt.

 

She briefly wonders if Gendo will stay after they're done.

 

 _That’s doubtful,_ the little voice in her head says. She’s decided to name it Yui.

 

Yui can be an ass sometimes.

 

\---

 

Gendo finishes inside her.

 

Rei doesn’t care. She can’t have children, anyways. At least not without some medical intervention. She wonders what it’d be like if she was able to.

 

She and Gendo would have a little girl. She’d have her father’s strong, defined features and dark hair. Her mother’s skin. She doesn’t know about her eyes yet. Minako, as Rei has decided to name her, would take after her mother, but she’d be brilliant, like her father. She’d be perfect.

 

Yui pipes up again. _Are you sure she’d even look like you_?

 

She’s my daughter, of course she’ll look like me, Rei replies.

 

 _How do you know that?_ Yui pauses. ... _What if she looks like_ **_her_ ** _?_

 

Rei’s mind freezes for a moment. She couldn’t have yet another thing taken from her. She wouldn’t.

 

Of course not, she tells Yui. I’m me.

 

(Gendo ends up staying for maybe an hour, holding her close and stroking her hair, but then the world catches up with him and he leaves. She just wants him to stay, to fall asleep next to her.)

 

\---

 

Gendo brings her flowers on one of his visits.

 

 _Look, Rei._ _His hands are covered in bandages. It’s your fault they’re there._

 

“Shut up, Yui.” She whispers it so Gendo can’t hear.

 

If he does, he doesn’t acknowledge it. “These are from me and some of the other scientists at NERV. Think of it as a get well soon present.” He looks around at the small room. “They'll help make this place look brighter.”

 

He ends up being right. Rei often finds herself stopping to admire the bouquet. She runs a finger over a sunshine yellow petal. (What had Gendo said they were? Tulips? She wasn't sure.)

 

She loves them. Gendo gets her some books on gardening, and she has them all read within a week.

 

\---

 

She hates mirrors. When she looks at them, she doesn’t see Rei. She sees Yui Ikari staring back out at her through red eyes.

 

She's really beginning to dislike Yui.

 

\---

 

Rei dies on a Wednesday.

 

She tells the crazy woman the truth, that Gendo doesn't really love her. The crazy woman doesn't take that well.

 

She wraps her hands around Rei’s neck, screaming profanities. She curses Yui, swearing oaths upon a name that isn't Rei’s. She must _really_ look like the woman.

 

_(Somewhere, in the far corners of her mind, a part of her muses that at least she knows someone else hates Yui Ikari as much as she does.)_

 

Her lungs ache and there's black spots in her vision. She's scratching at the woman’s hands, trying to pry them off of her damaged throat.

 

She’s losing strength. She's tired, so, _so_ tired, and she wants to give in to the darkness creeping into her vision.

 

Yui tells her to keep fighting. Rei’s never been one to listen to her.

 

Rei thinks of Gendo as she dies.

 

\---

 

One hot summer night Gendo comes to Rei’s room. He’s brought food with him. His hair is disheveled and she can see flecks of something scarlet on his gloves.

 

She asks him what he was doing. He tells her to please be quiet. He pulls his gloves off and stuffs them in the pocket of his jacket. She sees the scars on his hands and feels a pang of guilt.

 

Gendo hasn’t stopped looking at her oddly, not since she woke up a week ago. It feels like every time those brown eyes look at her, he sees someone else.

 

_(It takes Rei years to realize he wasn’t just seeing Yui.)_

 

She asks him again as he’s bringing the food out from the takeout bags. Gendo freezes, looking straight at the wall in front of him. A minute passes before he sighs in defeat.

 

He turns and leans against the table. His eyes are boring into her again. “It was a, ah…. _repayment_. For you.” She raises her eyebrows, silently urging him to go on. The bespectacled man gives her a look. “That’s all I’m telling you, so I’d suggest not bringing it up again.” He slides a styrofoam tray towards her.

 

“Eat. I brought Indian this time.”

\---

 

Sometimes things happen and Rei feels like she’s seen it before. She can’t explain it, no matter how hard she tries.

 

\---

 

Some nights, ones when he’s happy, Gendo comes into her room and talks to her. They talk about books or new developments in the Evas or the movie she watched in class.

 

Sometimes they even read together.

 

They sit side by side, her small frame is nestled next to his. His arm wraps around her shoulder, the other hand holding the book out so they both can read. He smells like aftershave and something smoky, and she finds herself growing fond of it.

 

 

_fin._

**Author's Note:**

> I feel like Rei's secretly a bookworm.


End file.
